


impossible

by dutchydoescoke



Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Pre-Canon, Gen, Parabatai Bond
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-04
Updated: 2017-02-04
Packaged: 2018-09-20 11:56:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,096
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9490013
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dutchydoescoke/pseuds/dutchydoescoke
Summary: When Jace shows up, it’s like the missing piece of a puzzle.Or: the one where their parabatai bond includes Izzy.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Remember how I said the Maia&Jace fic was super self-indulgent and terrible? I lied. This was 150% me just wanting to write Alec, Jace and Izzy as parabatai. *shrug*
> 
> AKA the one where I throw roughly 70% of canon as it applies to parabatai _out the frigging window_.

Alec and Izzy are inseparable when they’re kids, despite Alec being older, despite their parents’ attempts to get them to settle down. Alec sits through so many lectures on responsibility and behavior that he can recite them by rote.

In another universe, Alec might have caved to their expectations, given up his time with Izzy and focused on his work, but their parents don’t account for Izzy’s stubbornness. She pokes and prods and needles him until he spends time with her anyway, so he compromises, does everything else right, but he refuses to give up the time he spends with Izzy. They just get better at sneaking around, even at seven and nine, and spend more time out of their beds at night than in them.

Izzy gets them in the worst kinds of trouble and Alec pulls her out of it with wide eyes and the most sincere-sounding _I’m sorry, sir, we didn’t mean it_ when they get caught.

Their mother wants them to both be more responsible, Alec especially. He’s the oldest, he needs to be responsible and set a good example for his younger sister. Izzy, barely eight at the time, still seems to know better, and drags Alec along anyway, and they do dramatic recitations of their mother’s ridiculous speeches.

The crown doesn’t hang so heavy, here.

When Jace shows up, it’s like the missing piece of a puzzle. Alec, slowly slipping into the rigid expectations of their mother despite Izzy’s efforts, loosens again when Jace joins their adventures. It’s harder for him to put up a fight when both of them want to go, and if he’s along, it’s easier for him to get them out of trouble.

( _We break noses and accept the consequences_ is a motto they all live by, stubbornly taking whatever punishment they’re given for whatever it is they got into.)

Jace takes to the blades and hand-to-hand like he was built for it, wiping the floor with Izzy and Alec unless they team up on him. By the time Alec’s thirteen, he _can_ wipe the floor even when they team up.

Izzy masters the whip with a speed and ferocity that startles their parents, and Alec learns, almost as fast, to hide behind things so she can’t get him with it when they spar while Jace learns how to dodge. She learns to use it in tandem with her blade, pulling the feet out from under her target and pulling them close enough for her to beat.

Alec’s specialty is long range. Bows are his best weapon, the rough bowstring underneath his fingers one of the best feelings in the world, but he can throw knives better than Jace can, even learned how to use a sling for emergency situations. His blade work’s not bad, he can defend himself in a close combat fight and _win_ , but he’s the one who provides cover fire when Jace launches headlong into battle.

It should be no surprise to anyone that, when the subject of parabatai comes up, that their first response is to ask if three people can do it. Their parents say it’s impossible, but the three of them push. They’ve spent so much time training together that there’s no point in doing it if it can’t be all of them, at this point.

People learn, very quickly, not to tell them that some things are impossible. _Impossible_ just means _try harder_.

The single-mindedness that Alec comes by naturally, that their parents tried to instill in Izzy and Jace, comes out then, heads bent over dusty books for weeks while they look for a solution. Izzy finds it, in a book older than several countries, reading it out in a shaky voice while Alec and Jace crowd around her.

They set the ceremony, going ahead without their parents’ knowledge or approval, despite Alec’s vocal protests on the subject. Izzy and Jace both point out how likely it is that their parents will disapprove and he shuts up. When their parents come storming in, having received the approval notice from the the Council on their bond, the three of them stand firm. Every argument their parents try gets shut down, until Alec finally snaps that they shouldn’t have suggested it in the first place, if they didn’t want it to end up like this.

Their parents don’t attend the ceremony, not that any of them are particularly surprised.

Jace and Alec put the rune on Izzy first, holding tight to each other the entire time, and it goes from there. When they recite the Oath, there’s an excitement in Izzy’s eyes and Jace’s grin that Alec meets with his own smile. Feeling the bond settle around them is an experience Alec can’t summon words for. It’s just _right_.

The judgement people carry for their flagrant disregard for parabatai tradition is forgotten the first time everyone sees them in combat.

Alec finds high ground and holds it, injuring the enemies that Izzy’s aiming for. He gets them in the leg, usually, so she can loop her whip around their legs, pulling their feet out from under them and tossing them towards Jace, who kills them, in such a smooth motion that it looks rehearsed. And Alec knows which ones Izzy will go for almost before she does and he only has to save Jace once in the fight.

Whatever people might think of their attitude towards tradition, those people know better than to say it to any of their faces.

When Alec turns eighteen, their parents start leaving him in charge of the Institute, his penance for childhood misadventures and a lesson in responsibility. It’s an unnecessary lesson at best and an insulting one at worst.

His lessons in responsibility came from having Izzy and Jace to look after, even if their parents don’t see it that way.

He’s _still_ cleaning up their messes, even as they get older. That experience tells him how to phrase his reports to explain that the mission couldn’t wait for approval, that every action they took was weighed and measured against the law before they took it, that Izzy and Jace weren’t being reckless, just concerned for the mundanes’ safety.

By the time he’s twenty two, his bullshitting skills are on par with Izzy’s poker skills—a feat, considering she plays with the Seelies—and their parents leave them alone, barring their usual attempts to marry one of them off.

(He has Izzy and Jace, he doesn’t need a third person to look after.)

(That, of course, is when Clary Fray shows up.)


End file.
